Law Enforcement Officers

A Los Angeles judge on Friday denied a request by a camp ranger carjacked in Big Bear by Christopher Dorner to block the release of $1 million in reward money. Richard Heltebrake, who unsuccessfully sought the reward, contends he deserves it because his call to 911 helped tip off authorities. But on Friday, Judge Luis Lavin declined to grant a temporary restraining order that would have stopped authorities from disbursing the money to four people. Lavin made his decision citing lack of irreparable harm and because Heltebrake had not properly served several parties who may have opposed the order.

In the harrowing first minutes of the police shootout with suspected killer Christopher Dorner on Feb. 12 near Big Bear, officers scrambled to help two wounded officers who were ambushed outside a mountain cabin. “We need an airship! We have an officer down! Officer down!" one of the first responders shouted into his police radio. “Copy. Officer down. Officer down," a San Bernardino County Sheriff's dispatcher responded, her stress palpable. Voices from the gun battle were captured in 12 hours of static-filled sheriff's dispatch recordings released by the San Bernardino County attorney's office Monday.

Massachusetts officials lifted a stay-at-home order that had closed the bustling city of Boston and its environs. The mass transit system - the “T” - that had been idled since early Friday will go back to a normal schedule, officials announced. Police and elected officials indicated that the search was going on for the second of two suspects in Monday's Boston Marathon bombings. A first suspect, the elder of two brothers, died Friday after a firefight with law enforcement officers in Watertown.

BOSTON - An hour after the federal courthouse here was evacuated, a man in a blue uniform emerged from it and waved a large green flag. Gary Wente, a circuit executive at the John Joseph Moakley courthouse, came out to tell reporters that the courthouse had been secured. “We had a bomb threat," Wente said. "The building has been cleared.” Among those reentering were employees and jurors. FULL COVERAGE: Boston Marathon attack Earlier, law enforcement officers had sent young children from a day-care center, employees, jurors and private citizens out of the building.

Florida Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll abruptly resigned Tuesday from the office she has held for more than two years amid an investigation into an alleged illegal-gambling scheme that officials said has led to charges against 57 people. In a brief statement announcing her resignation, Carroll gave no details on her reason for stepping down. A spokesman for Gov. Rick Scott confirmed Wednesday that Carroll had been questioned by Florida Department of Law Enforcement officers about her work with Allied Veterans of the World, which described itself as a non-profit charity aiding veterans.

Flags throughout this sparkling beach town flew at half-staff Wednesday. The entire Police Department was meeting with grief counselors. Handmade signs cropped up, sympathy cards to a stunned city. "Thank you for your service Santa Cruz Police Department. RIP Detective Baker. RIP Detective Butler. " That's what Mary Gregg wrote in neat black letters on yellow construction paper, hanging her message in the window of the downtown check-cashing store where she works. "Something," she felt, "had to be said today.

The day before his death, San Bernardino County Sheriff's Deputy Jeremiah MacKay agreed to a request from his wife, Lynette: He stayed home from work. He spent the day enjoying the company of his stepdaughter, 6-year-old Kaitlyn, and his 4-month-old son, Cayden. For days before that respite, MacKay had been patrolling in the mountains where he had grown up, searching for Christopher Dorner, a former police officer suspected of a violent rampage that left three others dead. MacKay had volunteered for the task, said San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon during MacKay's funeral Thursday at San Manuel Amphitheater in San Bernardino.

Fugitive Christopher Dorner spent his final hours barricaded inside a mountain cabin armed with a high-powered sniper rifle, smoke bombs and a cache of ammo, shooting to kill and ignoring commands to surrender until a single gunshot ended his life, authorities said Friday. The evidence indicates that Dorner, a fired Los Angeles police officer suspected of killing four people and wounding three others, held a gun to his head and fired while the Big Bear area cabin he was holed up in caught fire, ignited by police tear gas. San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon, during a news conference Friday, offered the most detailed account yet of the manhunt and final shootout, which left one of his deputies dead and another seriously wounded.

San Bernardino County sheriff's officials have positively identified the charred remains found in a mountain cabin Tuesday as being the body of Christopher Dorner. Officials said they made the identification using dental records during the autopsy. The announcement brings a formal end to the epic manhunt for Dorner, who was accused of killing four people, including two law enforcement officers. He was killed at the end of a hours-long standoff in a cabin near Big Bear on Tuesday afternoon.

The manhunt for Christopher Dorner in one sense ended successfully: Assuming that the body recovered from the burnt-out home in Big Bear is his, Dorner's rampage is over, and he won't harm anyone again. Yet it's hard to cheer an episode that left four people dead and that featured police officers firing wildly on innocent civilians in their determination to eradicate a man who had threatened them. It's understandable that police would be enraged by Dorner. He openly declared war on all law enforcement officers and embarked on a killing spree specifically aimed at his former colleagues.